


The Snake and The Doe

by jordieblob16



Series: Oneshots (A Collection from Many Fandoms) [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-10-16 14:16:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10572993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jordieblob16/pseuds/jordieblob16
Summary: "He has her eyes. Precisely her eyes."





	

Cold black eyes scanned the faces of the students. The hall was loud, happy, teeming with excitement, the joy of coming back to Hogwarts, but one person wasn't enjoying the festivities.

Professor Severus Snape sat silently, not eating nor bothering to make meaningless chatter with his colleagues. His eyes slowly slid over the crowd, drinking in the newly arrived first years and deciding which ones would be worth tolerating for the next seven years. A mild expression of interest remained on his face as he did this, aloof and unbothered.

But then, he spotted someone in the crowd, a boy so similar to the ghost from his past that Snape actually froze and stared. The boy had been hidden from his gaze before, during the sorting. He had heard the name called, the whispers, the loud declaration of "GRYFFINDOR" but the striking similarity to James hadn't been clear before.

The object of his gaze turned, as if sensing the eyes upon him.

And green eyes met the black ones.

"He has her eyes. Precisely her eyes."

He would not flinch nor look away, refusing to be a coward and hide away from her eyes.

***

The ghosts of the Potter's were very obviously not done with him yet.

That much came fully to the light in his first lesson with the boy, the green eyes of Lily ogling at him stupidly (so very unlike the person they had come from), peering out from the mop of hair that Potter had inherited from James. Though he possessed her eyes, not one drop of her talent or brilliance showed in the boy. He proved this quickly, cluelessly sitting by the muggleborn with her hand stretched high into the air, doubtlessly knowing every answer while Potter failed miserably.

The boy made it very easy to hate him.

Yet Severus remained entirely incapable of despising her eyes, incapable of not feeling the knife of grief in his chest every time he saw them.

***

Was it punishment, he wondered, having her eyes in his life once more, almost everyday? Did he deserve this for what he had said and done to Lily? For what he had done to her family?

Perhaps he did.

***

He couldn't let the boy die. Hate him, yes. Let him perish, let the last living trace of Lily Evan's slip through his fingers?

No.

The Dark Lord could not, would not prevail. He would sooner die than let Lily's sacrifice be in vain.

***

The fool almost got himself killed, yet again.

What a dishonor to Lily it would be to have her son murdered by an overly aggressive tree.

The boy was not to die.

***

They called him the Heir of Slytherin. Something dark was astir.

This was not the future, not the peace Lily had died for.

***

The dark figure strode down the rocky path to the lake, his black cloak sweeping behind him. Around him, Dementors began to hover, impatiently waiting for the protection of the Patronus to cease, for it to be safe for them to swoop down on their victims once more.

The boy, almost killed over a murdering traitor.

Lily, dead for her son.

And what would he die for?

***

"So it begins again," Albus Dumbledore told Severus, gazing out the window of the hospital wing with his hands folded behind his back. Below on the grounds, the maze was still sprawled, the maze and the scheme that had ended both the Triwizard Tournament and the life of a student. His eyes shifted to Snape. "Are you ready?"

The man looked at the sleeping form of Harry Potter, and the promise tumbled dryly from his lips before he could process what it truly meant.

"Always."

***

The Dark Lord could see into his mind.

But he would not, could not win, because Severus could prevent this sick intrusion into Potter's mind.

He had taken the light from Lily's eyes once.

He would never do it again.

***

Who else would die before justice was brought to Voldemort? Was it worth it, the children without parents, the parents without children? The life of Dumbledore, of the only woman he had ever loved, the life of her son?

Would he himself be willing to die?

He wouldn't be dying for Lily anymore, not for her eyes, and not for her sacrifice.

But was dying a reasonable price to pay for the future Lily would have wanted?

***

Green eyes frantically skimmed over the dying man, trying desperately to find a way to help, to staunch the bleeding, to end the dying.

But it was too late now.

Harry had the memoires. He would die.

But what would he think of Snape in his final hours? As a coward? As a bully?

It hardly mattered.

"Look at me." He uttered.

The green eyes met the black ones, and Snape remembered those eyes from long ago, even as the last of life seeped out of him.

_"We are greater than the labels they give us." Lily told him quietly, kindly, as she always did. The two watched the retreating backs of James Potter and Sirius Black. "You're much more than a coward, a loser- I know that's not how you really are. Just like I- a mudblood a muggle- am much more than that. All we have to do," she said, the green eyes meeting the black ones, "is prove them wrong."_

"You have your mother's eyes."

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I joined AO3. Let's get writing.


End file.
